This episode: The team prepares to enter the tower, when Randus shows up out of no where.
[podcast]http://traffic.libsyn.com/majorspoilers/critical_hit_121.mp3[/podcast]Take the jump for the image from this episode.
Contact us at podcast@majorspoilers.com
A big Thank You goes out to everyone who downloads, subscribes, listens, and supports this show. We really appreciate you taking the time to listen to our ramblings each week. Tell your friends about the podcast, get them to subscribe and, be sure to visit the Major Spoilers site and forums.
122 Comments
I must have missed episode 120.5 because I have no idea whats going on here who are these characters? Who is Rob playing? What!?
Ok I thought I was the only one phew! WHAT IS GOING ON HERE!! I feel like Timon from the lion king!
*jumps up and down* “DID I MISS SOMETHING?”
Seeing how Brian stated time hijinx, I’m guessing parallel universe due to the Chronomter.
Did I miss an episode somewhere?
Only if you didn’t listen to all of the episodes. This is the episode that follows #120.
Something seems wrong, the last thing in episode 120 was the party returning to the ship and now they are in a temple? and then Randus comes there from the dream dimension thingy?
Maybe you’re looking at it from the wrong angle. Ah… I know what is wrong… you are looking to the past to find the answer…
Alright Stephen, go ahead and have some fun with us… These guys (whoever they are) are going after a chronometer, so timey-wimeyness is not completely unjustified. It was actually alluded to last episode, if i remember right. And you do have a shirt saying F* Continuity, after all…
After listening to this episode, the only question I have is… IS KET DEAD???
I don’t know who’s more awesomely devious. Rodrigo for what he’s done with this part of the story or you, Stephen, for how you’re presenting it to us!
I’m not sure I understand what you are saying… I’m presenting the episode as recorded. If you are confused about the story, you should be focusing your attention on Rodrigo.
You could also try listening to episode #117 and then #121 and see if that makes any more sense for you.
Oh it’s absolutely continuous with respect to #117 and clever listeners can follow what’s happening, but many people are confused about the sudden absense of Albrecht and Ket as well as the simultaneous introduction of Relara and Grenschack. Can’t wait for the next pods of casting or major spoilering, keep up the great work guys!
Yeah, exactly my thought when I downloaded it. The comment about killing Rob’s character (combined with the fact that neither Gla or Ket are their) was particularly worrisome for me.
Gla not being there isn’t that worrisome since Orem isn’t there either since Gla is with Orem. Only Randus disappeared in the previous episode (the most recent one with Orem, Randus, Albrect, and Gla).
I’m going to hope Ket was taken somewhere else ya know that whole being marked thing.
I’ve just finished listening to episode 120 and it’s just the fight with magma spiders and the destruction of the magic book for Lolth, there is no description of the new characters
Why would there be?
who is the Grenshack (? ) and Relara (?) they seem to have appeared from nowhere
“She” apparently took out exploding skeletons at some tower. I don’t remember hearing about those either D:
@zeeZ maybe its a parallel universe……
I think the “exploding skeletons” remark referred to the party’s encounter at one of the moon towers back in Four Against The Void. He’s jokingly implying that she was there in this timeline, and that battle consequently went differently.
Wow, I was beginning to worry that you guys were getting tired of this, as the last few shows had been a little less energetic (or maybe I was less excited about them, as I was getting a bit used to it,) but THIS one just brought me right back in. Randus, giant rowboats, nat 20 Comet-fall Charge, and a variety of shenanigans in this episode.
Also, I’d like to note, as a first time commenter, that despite the first paragraph, Critical Hit is THE best D&D or any tabletop RPG podcast on the entire Internets, end even on your worst day you guys are still awesome to listen to.
Ditto
AGREED!
For those of you confused, they are retrieving the chronometer, a device that somehow >manipulates time<
I am still only getting 6 minutes of the podcast (4MB in size) downloading to iTunes or from direct download on the site. Does anyone have the full episode yet?
I’ve also only got that much… It says in the itunes store it should be almost an hour and a half, but downloading from here or there only gives 6:19.
Whaaaat? What’s going on here?
They set up some hints…. “If you recall the last session” And Randus mentioning fixing time. Interesting storytelling technique
DnD Brian @ Minute 16- In this Universe it does
I’m also only getting 6 minutes. Interesting.
I’m guessing the Confusion is on purpose as Randus is doing something timey wimey at least thats all i can think of
So now Randus is cyborg doctor who nice!
Is is just me, or is this a 6 minute episode :-(
Well, that’s six minutes of I don’t know what the heck is going on. And why is it only six minutes long?
Indeed, Itunes lists it at 1 hour and 26 minutes, but then only downloads 6 minutes of audio.
Both iTunes and the site are only giving 6 minutes worth, and the 6 minutes they give only heightens my suspense! We need to know what’s going on!
If you did an auto-download last night, delete that file, then redownload the episode. The complete episode is available as I’ve downloaded it myself over a dozen times
I just tried again. Still getting only 3.9MB out of 50mb listed from Itunes, the RSS Feed link, and from the direct download. 6 minutes of audio. :(
Just tried all three sources again, still same results. Clicking the Listen at the page top also caps at 6 minutes and 18 seconds.
Same results from all three sources this try.
I was able to download the full 1:26 this morning also, on the first try.
I tuned in for an episode of Critical Hit, and a Doctor Who show broke out. Or is this simply a relaunch? Hmmmm. Only time will tell, I guess.
I downloaded it from here in the UK and got the full 1:26:46 of awesomeness. Yay for confusing timey wimey – ness. Just want to get all the episodes to listen to the whole lot and hopefully it’ll make sense.
Now to go back in time and kill my Grandfather before my dad was conceived!
Also as a geologist, quartz pillars are very difficult to make resonant at a level audible to humans… too damn hard, they’ll be more likely to fracture and fail than resonate.
Dude – it’s just a podcast.
Sorry inner scientist / troll couldn’t stop myself…
although maybe hollow pillars may work… might have to experiment on this…
Aren’t the finest champagne and wine glasses made of quartz crystal ?
Quartz Pillars shaped like this ? :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ThomasBlochHandsGlassharmonica_low_notes_on_left_and_high_notes_on_right.jpg
Nah that is just lead crystal glass used for champers glasses. Also asked my rock mechanics lecturer today in labs and he said that my assumptions are correct and quartz can’t resonate at a frequency audible to humans, unless it is ultra thin and even then it’ll shatter immediately, so only a single note from each hyper thin pillar
It says right here in my Steampunk Guide to Physics that if you temper blown molten crystal quartz columns in astral seawater it forms a hyper-glaven crystal matrix which every first year Techno-magus knows, this enables notes as low as basso profundo.
Also, not everyone in the party is human…
true, I am making the assumption the races played have a human level of hearing. However it is mentioned that SOW can hear the notes and he is human, unless he has some crazy monk skillz for hearing. Also it’s a hypo-glaven structure that allows it to resonate
I just tried to download and I’m also getting 6 minutes, 3.91 mb.
Oh come onn this new 52 is lame they start in the middle of no where and its short
jokeing aside Even when i direct down load it I only get 6 minutes
Confused here…. Still trying to find the full podcast
Between xkcd and Red vs Blue, Brian has really been up on the references that I am actually young enough to understand. Way to go!
And it’s not on the frogpants ultra feed….
Marvelously done folks. Eager to find out more about what happens!
All of you who can only get 6 min of the podcast, well… Kinda funny how it only happens during the episode with Penelope’s Chronometer.
Well clearly there’s hijinks, but are people just messing with saying they got the whole thing or is there a way to manipulate time (change computer clock?) that would get the whole episode.
Nope got the whole thing. Manual download at 6:45 am. Download early to miss the server traffic.
I’m 100% sure this has nothing to do with server traffic.
I also want to ask this question – I know the answer will be “wait and see”. How many real-time episodes are between this one and #120? C’mon Stephen. Geeks gotta know the mechanics! How did Rodrigo set up this episode for you? Short backstory prefaced by “go with it”?
Arrggggh. This feels like a LSH storyline. :)
i’m not sure what you mean by realtime episodes? there was last week’s episode followed by this week’s episode. There are no “missing” episodes. All is occuring as it should.
Just trying to figure out how Rodrigo worked time travel into a (relatively) linear story.
Are you sure it is time travel?
:) Touche’ . It will be fun to find out.
Ugh. This sucks. I was hoping to procrastinate today by listening.
Agreed… I’ve re-downloaded it over and over again, and it’s only ever six minutes. It sounds like a really good episode, too. :(
Everyone trying to download but still getting the short file, use a second browser on the direct download, or if you are using chrome, click the right mouse and open the “direct download” link on this page in a new incognito browser session.
Spoilers: Orem is actually a Tesselector Orem, and his marriage to the King’s rebellious daughter happens in an alternate timeline.
Nope, options don’t work.
don’t know what to tell those of you who are having troubles downloading. Everything is fine, and the complete file is there on the feed. the dierect download link above also works. you might try clearing your cache
Sorry bout that Stephen, I cleared that file from soundcloud.
it was downloaded 4 times.
I have tried downloading several times in several different ways and am only getting a six minute podcast. What is happening?
Thank you very much BavarianGnomes! :) I had just tried to grab the file in Chrome, Safari, and IE9 (mainly use FF7) and still was seeing 3.9mb. Thanks to your link, I now am getting the full show. :)
please don’t post our shows via other services. i understand it is frustrating for those who have cache issues, but posting in other places and sending stat data does not help the cause mostly because we have no way of verifying the data, and those companies who are currently watching the downloads for future advertising will shy away, which does not help us at all. thanks for understanding.
Understood and file was downloaded 4 times in about 30 minutes before i removed it, sorry should have emailed you first. Bias to break and all, better to ask forgiveness? :D
thanks for being helpful. it looks like it is a problem affecting a small group of listeners.
It has to be some CDN as BG speculated before. I’ve tried 4 browsers (FF7 multiple times), Itunes (multiple times), clearing cache, and switching DNS with the same results, a 3.9mb file lasting 6m19s. I’ll try again another day.
Yep, I tried a subset of the same things, and none of them worked (from Argentina). Anyone having the same problem will probably just have to wait a few days, and there’s nothing anyone (including Major Spoilers) can do about it.
Today when I refreshed podcasts 25 minutes ago, the full Critical Hit 121 file came down the pipe. Itunes must have reissued it, as I had already deleted many bad copies of files with the same name and this one just popped up as the new episode (instead of one I’ve already deleted) when I clicked Refresh. :D Can’t wait to listen to it after work!
I made a complaint to apple, they tell me that they have corrected the problem and it’s working fine for me, hope it fixes everybody else as well.
Working for me, too, now. Downloaded and ready to hear!
And no fix? :-/ it’s not cache, and never works on any retry.
55 comments! Wow
Alright, who did it? Who was saying “Candyman” at the beginning of this episode? I understand this may only be affecting a “small” amount of people on here but looking over the notes it seems there sure are quite a few people like myself that are only getting about six minutes of the episode. I’ve direct downloaded and tried to get it from itunes to no avail as well. Wish I could join the mind trip with the rest of you, but it is kinda hard to do that when the ship won’t sail!
Maybe it will work for you tomorrow, but as I’ve said, and as I’ve checked (and triple checked multiple times) the file is there in its entirety. It downloads completely. You may indeed fall into that small number of people who got caught in some kind of temporal cache problem, but I can assure you, it is a small number of people who appear to be experiencing an issue compared to the thousands who have downloaded the episode since its release last night.
I wish I could help you out, but when people simply say, “It’s not working for me, can you fix it?” and don’t provide information like their location, internet service provider, platform, browser, iTunes version being used, account and password, make and model of their first car, social security number or national I.D., home phone number of their girlfriend who they are not spending time with tonight, bank account, and their favorite flavor of malt-o-meal, it’s hard to track down exactly what the problem may be. From everything we have tested today, everything is working, so from our stand point the problem is not on our end. I wish I could help you – all of you – but there is not a problem on our severs, the file, or with our podcast provider that I can see.
Whenever there is a problem with any podcasts I download, I usually delete the podcast episode in question, unsubscribe to the podcast in itunes, and then resubscribe, which forces the latest episode to download.
I will also say that an episode is never released on this website until it has been tested as fully working and fully downloadable. If you follow MajorSpoilers on Twitter, you will also note I caution people about attempting to force a download prior to an official Twitter announcement that the episode is available because listeners have forced a download as the episode was uploading and have experienced similar problems. But again, i can assure you that this website does not release a podcast before its time.
I understand your frustration, and like I said, maybe tomorrow it will “magically” work for you, and for the foreseeable future, the file will be available for future generations to love and enjoy. Unless of course our bills keep piling up and we have to pull the plug on the whole thing.
I honestly don’t know what to do about it, this episode isn’t downloading completely, it comes up complete at 3.9 megs and plays to 6:19 It shows in i-tunes as being 1:26:45, but its not downloading completely for whatever reason. Ive tried downloading it in i-tunes, firefox, and internet explorer, but its just not working. I have no idea why this is going on, and i’m VERY frustrated. Right clicking and opening up the direct download in a different window/tab doesn’t work either. Not getting the full episode there either.
Still no luck breaking the six minute mark for me. I have unsubscribed many times and also deleted my Podcast entry for C.H. and resubscribed through the store. I also tried the RSS feed through Google reader. Same 4MB download.
Maybe we can find a pattern?
I am:
in Los Angeles
Time Warner service provider
Windows 7 platform
Chrome browser (auto-updated)
iTunes 10.5.0.142
Anything else that might be relevant?
Seems to be working this morning, but the download is happening very, very slowly. Still, better that than no episode. Critical Hit is my regular Friday night date! :)
Well there you go then, all it took was a little time…
I think the 6 min file is affecting more just jsut a few listeners.
I am getting it too
I tried to download on 2 different computers – the one I always use for podcasts and one is strictly a gaming machine that I never use for downloads, email, anything. The same result 3.9 meg and 6 min of audio – then I broke out a retired laptop took it to a wifi hotspot tried again with the same result.
The point of my story is not to bother with blowing out your cache or deleting and resubscribing your just wasting your time the problem is not on your end.
Seems like a lot of people are having this problem. Can we get a transcript or a detailed description of what happened?
i am is sad =(
Sad too. Look forward to it, and it doesn’t work no matter what.
Why won’t they fix? Clearly a glitch.
As I said before, there is not a glitch on our end, there is nothing for us to fix.
I figured out a work around for the short download; if I stream the podcast directly from the Critical Hit page in the iTunes store, I get the full 1:26. Hopefully that helps. Nothing else I tried works (different browsers, different computers, direct download from this page, deleting and re-downloading from iTunes)
So, next session will be Sir Brenzan teaming up with freedom fighters to save the dying world from future- I mean, Evil Goatee Orem and his army of void monsters?
Hanta, I’ve verified the problem exists for me if I connect with my VPN Service in Argentina and Australia. Its a problem with Libsyn’s regional cache, libsyn tech support needs to fix this, the file is good in 8/10 countries I tested this with.
http://libsyn.com/3/contact/
I sent a message to Stephen to open a ticket with libsyn support, as this public contact form probably has a longer wait than the paying customer queue.
Im utterly confused here episode 120 ends in they have destroyed the book, vectna has left them some info, they return to the ship, and you mention that next week will possibly be an entire Q and A. 121 starts you say “in the last session” two entirely new charecters: Grenchak and Relara, and that the party have made thier way to the quarts temple. and looking back at the past 5 episodes, none of that makes sense something has gone wrong here.
No.Everything is playing out as it should.
It’s part of the story, just roll with it. Don’t do what I did and relisten to the last 5 pods trying to figure out when the new/alternate characters appeared thinking you missed it. It’ll just irritate you and i almost gave up on it. All will be revealed at some point, or they’ll continue to split off until we have an entire four-man team led by each pre-existing character they’ve ever played. They should definitely have enough people to take down the Void then.
Tried downloading them again this morning, on itunes, directly onto my iphone via its wifi connection, and in IE and Firefox. I’ve got the latest version of iTunes, 10.5, and its still coming up 6 minutes on all those sources. Still no change.
Having the same problem here as well as 4 of my friends here in canada. Guess we will keep waiting…
I still cannot get the full podcast I have tried with different means (itunes, internet explorer, firefox, chrome, safari, opera). I have even tried different computers nothing has worked.
Don’t know if this helps, but a new version of the podcast downloaded via iTunes in the last hour. Hopefully folks with issues can get a good copy now? It’s an interesting episode ;-)
Arggghhhh! In dire need of aspirin and or arsenic…
So Randus’ mind ran so fast that he somehow vibrated himself into the Torquettes universe? Nice!
Yeah, itunes now has the full podcast! I didn’t even have to tell it to download it automaticly did it with my subscription. What ever you did thank you.
I got the full thing nowz i’m am very happy now!!!! yeah!
Now working for me… so anyone who had trouble before, now’s the time to try again.
WOW more than 100 comments. Is this the most commented post in MSP history?
Surely most commented Critical hit.
Yep! And all it took was a faulty file followed by a neat swerve in the story! :)
I got about 7-8 minutes into listening and stopped to come here and see if i could clarify the situation. Seeing 109 comments before even entering the specific thread, I knew my suspicians were on the right track. Nice swerve there guys! Will be waiting on the edge of my seat for the full explanation to come.
Gah, well I guess that explains it. I was quite frustrated going through past episodes trying to figure out what happened though. I honestly couldn’t enjoy this episode because of that.
Agreed. Oh well it’s free. Lol.
Long time listener – 1st time poster….
Just wanted to say I love this podcast and long may it continue….and what a fabulous twist! I just thought I’d missed something but listened through regardless, still thought it was awesome – but after a few of the comments I realised jsut how well thought out the twist was.
Congratulations – you’ve just hit a new level!
I guess I was one of the fortunate ones that was able to get the episode to download properly on the first try. Granted, my initial reaction to the first few minutes were right along with what Tork was saying – “Huh? Whut? Huh?” – but I think I’ve got a pretty good grasp of what’s going on now. Either that or I’m waaaay over-thinking the possible plot threads *grin*
Stephen, thank you for your patience and diligence in looking into the problem. I’ve also been able to get the podcast too. Apple, COME ON MAN!! Jobs passes away and you drop the ball in providing this podcast to the masses? I find you UNACCEPTABLE!! That’s my one SNL reference! :)
I had to listen to this two times. It is like a koan. There is no right or wrong answer. The clues are there for us to interpret and we’ll get more answers the next episode. I liked it no matter how confused I was, and I can’t wait for more.
Did I hear right that gren is a hybrid wizard/something-else?
This was the best episode in weeks! Kudos to the team. I did have to listen to the last 10 minutes of action (before the Q&A) in #117 to figure out what was going on, but once I got it I totally loved it!! Woot!
And you guys did an awesome job at alluding to the past events in this timeline, adding to the confusion and reality of it (Gren always rolls low initiative, reference to the tower fight and flaming skeletons from Four Against the Void going differently with Relara there, etc.).
I was wondering why I got 2 complete copies of this episode in iTunes with 2 different date stamps (11/4 and 11/6), but after reading the dozens of comments now I know!! Whew!
Finally — I love xkcd too! Very happy to hear that reference.
Cheers!
You are cruel, I was so confused for like 15 minutes in here thinking, well, I was distracted last episode, but no, new characters, shifting all around, I hate you.
BTW, Critical Hit is the best.
Re-listening to this episode, and I am wondering if Relara was supposed to be the character Matthew’s wife intended to play. Or was it Stephen’s Wife? Well.. either way.